I ate some Cannelloni once at this kid’s birthday party. His mother came into the kitchen and screamed at me that it was their dinner and I should stay out of her refrigerator. I’m sorry, I said, that orange sherbet and sheetcake you got going on in the den just ain’t doin’ it for me, lady. She quickly ushered me out the side door and told me never to come back. The joke was on her ‘though since I wasn’t invited to the party in the first place!

I was at Harris Teeter the other evening, doing a bit of late night shopping, and I noticed a line of those electronic buggies by the entrance – you know the ones that you can ride around on when the staff’s not looking. Well, there’s this great big sign on the front on the basket that reads: No children in basket. So I looked and I looked and, yep, sure enough – there were no children in the basket. Why the heck they needed to put a sign on it stating the bleedin’ obvious I’ll never know!

I don’t care who the hell you are or what your politics are, if you don’t intrinsically understand the need for public broadcasting and the services it can provide then at the very least trust me when I say the amount of love that this man below has generated throughout his life should create enough good will to have Congress cut CPB a blank check. As it is, PBS and NPR and public broadcasting as a whole are pretty much fighting for their lives right now and we don’t have Fred Rogers around any more to give Senators goosebumps, which is a bloody shame.

What a bloody rotten day. Damn it all, a freakin’ horrible day. It was sunny and 76 and Mother Nature had finally made it up to us all after that Winter from Hell which practically doubled my power bill but I turned on the computer and what do I see? These headlines:

Planet could be ‘unrecognizable’ by 2050

50 million ‘environmental refugees’ by 2020

Quake in New Zealand kills at least 65

Oral sex linked to cancer risk

Gulf oil spill: Scientist finds ocean floor still oily, dead

U.S. Must Take Space Storm Threat Seriously, Experts Warn

What? What in blazes? Did every reporter wake up on the wrong side of the bed today and decide that it was just the amazingly perfect time to bum us all the hell out? Makes a bloke just want to stay in bed and hug the cloth monkey. Nope, not a metaphor, just a reference to the late 50s/early 60s Harry Harlow social isolation experiments. (Yeah, I know – even amidst all this angst and depressing news, I’m still too hip for the room, right?)

So I ask you: when faced with what can only be termed a crushing amount of mind crap from the Fourth Estate, what’s a body to do? Simple. Whistle.

I was thinking just the other day that I’m not always completely forthcoming with you folks. Let’s face it – I lie like a dog politician on a rug. So, in the interest of total disclosure, here’s a big ol’ fat list of things you probably didn’t know about me. Live and learn. (And then get Luvs.)

1. When I was two, I wanted to be a rooster when I grew up.
2. I have seen Hall and Oates in concert. Twice.
3. I had a joke printed on the Mini Page when I was in first grade.
4. During college, I worked as a paid escort for wealthy socialites.
5. In sixth grade, I played hide and seek with Kool from Kool & the Gang.
6. I once auditioned to be an MTV Veejay.
7. I am allergic to Peanuts. The comic strip, not the legume.
8. I was on the chess team in junior high.
9. Each night, around 2:15am, I wake in a cold sweat screaming the name of “Paul Lynde.”
10. I was the voice of Scrappy Doo.
11. I believe in the future! I believe in science!
12. I spent one night in London on the floor of a bathroom.
13. Every year on his birthday, I anonymously put flowers on the grave of Edgar Allen Poe.
14. I scored only 760 on my SAT. 600 verbal, 160 math.
15. I was born with a vestigial tail.
16. A hot dog makes me loose control.
17. I wore a mullet in high school.
18. All my exes live in Texas.
19. I cry every time I watch “Touched By An Angel.”
20. I truly believe ketchup should be considered a vegetable.
21. I turned state’s evidence against John Gotti in 1993.
22. I am the illegitimate love child of Spiro Agnew and Joey Heatherton.
23. I have an obsessive crush on Justine Bateman.
24. I sleep with a Hello Kitty plush.
25. Not only do I not know the meaning of the word fear, I have trouble pronouncing it and using it in a sentence.

Ah. Hmmm. Okay. Possibly there is such a thing as too much information, eh?

I was going through some old boxes in the spare room when I found an old card that someone sent to me when I was a kid. There’s this cartoonish tiger on the front and inside there’s the following: “Here’s hoping your tonsilectomy went gr-r-r-r-r-eat!”

There is no name on the card. I’ve no idea who sent it. And I never had my tonsils taken out.